Thursday, February 05, 2015

SCOTT WALKER IS NOW THE GOP FRONT-RUNNER

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) holds a big lead among New Hampshire Republicans in the early primary state, drawing 21 percent support among likely voters in a poll by news network NH1 released Wednesday.

The governor is the biggest beneficiary of 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney’s decision to sit out 2016. Two weeks ago, when Romney was flirting with a bid, Walker won 8 percent of the vote. Romney led that poll with 29 percent.

Oh, and there was that whole Drudge Report poll which, while not scientific in the least, certainly isn't a bad thing for Walker. He took 44 percent, after all.

Drudge isn't the only one running an unscientific but Walker-friendly online poll of right-wingers. There's also this, from the Daily Caller:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is the current favorite of Republicans for 2016, according to a unique form of online polling conducted in partnership with The Daily Caller that gauges conservative interest for potential GOP presidential candidates.

The survey -- operated by the organization Contract From America -- asks users to pick favorite candidates in multiple head-to-head match-ups. It’s not scientific, but does indicate which candidates are popular with conservatives.

“By doing so, we elicit the deeper preferences of users well beyond their top choice, which prevents the kind of ‘gaming’ that is often seen in other online polls,” said Ryan Hecker of Contract From America, which runs the poll.

For example, a user may be asked to choose between Scott Walker and Ted Cruz. After that, the user may be asked to choose between Marco Rubio and Rand Paul. That process continues on and on with a variety of potential presidential candidates.

With 935,119 total votes, here are the latest results, as of Wednesday:

Does an online poll from Matt Drudge seem a little hinky to you? Or one from FreedomWorks and the Daily Caller? Yeah, me too. But there's a lot of effort going into the process of making Walker seem like the people's choice. And -- for now, at least -- it seems to be working.